Skeptic
Dear Corporate Shrink,
I’m the head of HR at a medium size company of 350 employees. We conduct a great deal of technical training for our employees and I’m convinced that’s valuable and necessary. However, when it comes to "soft" training employees on interpersonal and leadership skills, I have a hard time seeing the value. We’ve tried a couple of lunch presentations but I didn’t see any long term use. How does that stuff add to the bottom line?
Dear Skeptic,
"Soft" training has become a "hard" sell in the past three years of a very tough competitive global economy. You are right in being practical and asking the "What’s in it for us?" business question. However, let me give you a few thoughts for you to consider.
A couple of lunch presentations are not a fair trial. You must first ask yourself whether you are really open to discovering possible value in non-technical training. Try asking colleagues in other companies about their experiences. You may find some that have a positive view. Ask them to try to explain how such training was helpful.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not proposing that all human factor training produces positive business results. I’m personally not enamored with training that focuses on a day of games as the main technique to build long lasting productive communication and teambuilding.
Effective human factor training is a process. The first step is figuring out what you want to accomplish. Are you responding to a perceived problem (absenteeism; tardiness; lack of follow through and accountability; lack of initiative; etc.)? If so, depending on the root cause of the problem, "training" may or may not help. In fact, it can make matters worse. Employees who are resentful because they already feel overworked will not respond favorably to being told they have to take a time management workshop during their work schedule. Why should they want to learn do more work when they feel they do enough? The workshop will seem like "just more work" and increase resentment. The perceived problem has to be well understood first, so you can come up with the correct remedy - which may or may not be more "training".
When you are not responding to a problem but are looking for employee improvement, as when you wish to increase sales by building on the interpersonal skills of your sales force, you again have to do some preliminary homework. You want to define your ideal salesperson. A cookie cutter seminar on "How to Make Your Sales Force a Winning Team" may not be what you are looking for. Knowing the qualities, traits, values of your ideal salesperson will also help in employee selection.
You get my point. Effective training takes reflective thinking and common sense preparation.
It also is rare that a one-shot training session does the trick. You need to have a road map involving needs assessment - design the training - train - assess its effectiveness - make changes - assess again. By this time, if it’s not working, the problem and/or goals are not properly defined; the expectations may be too high given the resources; or you need to get a new learning professional.
Now, let’s get back to your skepticism. There are two main factors that determine successful training. One is employee resistance. We touched on an example of that. The training has to make sense to employees and it works best when they, or their representatives, are involved in mapping out the training process. The other is the attitude of management. Management has to support it. You have to believe in it. It’s best when you set the example through participation. It starts at the top.
I’m not expecting you to simply step back and incorporate this perspective I’m selling you. I’m sure you are already pretty busy and this all feels like more work to you. You don’t have to do it alone. There are good learning professionals who have the background and training to help you focus and assess the business challenges you are wrestling with that involve the human factor. Interview some. Find one that you feel you can work with and who will give you your money’s worth.
Human resources are a company’s most valuable asset. Developing and retaining talented employees are keys to survival in today’s competitive market place. Companies that are learning organizations are ahead of the game.